Why is it so hard to rest?

Pick up any book on the pagan Wheel of the Year and it will tell you that winter is a time for rest. And I get it. All that darkness and cold pulls us to the soft embrace of hibernation. But I’d like to put forth the argument that Summer is an equally important time for rest.

Because summer is expansive. All the sunlight and heat and things to do. Everything feels heightened. Buzzing. Like all the lights are on at the same time and you’re teetering on the edge of overstimulation at any given moment.

Multiply that by this particular summer with *waves arms* everything we’ve got floating around in the collective consciousness? The grief, the rage, the fear, the hope. The unprecedented experience of navigating the ‘dying times’ that we’re living through. It’s a lot.

It's never been harder to make time to rest or to access the kind of rest that is radical and restorative, not numbing or dissociative. 

But rest is vital.
Not only do we need it to function, we need it to imagine.
We need rest to gather ourselves back in to centre.
It’s how we stave off burnout and embody more sustainable ways of living.

And we know it. So what is it so hard to do?

These are the most common roadblocks we bump into, as gleaned from my years of working with clients and from my own practice:

1. We’re not taught to value or prioritise rest

Otherwise know as - living in capitalism.

Capitalism drills into us that our rest has to be earned. Which means we’re pretty much running on high all the time. Pushing through, hustling, frantically trying to prove (to ourselves usually) that we’ve done enough to be worthy of a break. And then resting juuuust long enough to recuperate so we can get back to being productive.

We've got to reclaim rest, not as a reward but as an unquestionable part of being a human in a soft animal body. We get to recalibrate our nervous system baselines towards rest. 

2. We’re only doing one facet of resting

Our bodies are complex and multifaceted and our rest needs to be too.

Problem is that the kind of rest we often see is the kind that can be sold as Self Care (TM) (hi, again capitalism!). The weekend retreat in a secluded cabin, the bath with candles and bath bombs, the Netflix binge couch date with your Squishmallows. They might restore you physically but what about mentally? Energetically? Emotionally?

Unless we’re tuning in to the different aspects of our life that need rest, we’re not accessing holistic restoration. Radical rest means that all the parts of yourself get to be nourished.

3. It doesn’t feel safe to rest

And our nervous systems aren’t designed to rest if we don’t feel safe.

We become so used to our nervous system buzzing on high that we become habituated to it. Overstimulation becomes our baseline. It’s almost like the busy gets caught in our bones.

And that’s not even mentioning those of us with histories of trauma or marginalised identities, where the mere act of existing in the world can feel like a threat. How can you slow down when you’ve got to stay vigilant all the time?

Slowing down can feel like a threat because rest is vulnerable as hell.

4. We confuse numbness with rest

Don’t get me wrong, there’s a time and a place for numbness. There’s a wisdom in numbness. And we need to be able to access restful states as well.

Because rest is not numbing.

Rest is presence. It’s the place where we can be grounded and in deep relationship with one another and the world around us. It’s where we can dream, and connect to our intuition. Rest is a state of ‘I am’, of openness and compassion.

When we can rest rather than numb, we embody the best of our humanness. We become conduits of peace for the wider world.

And what to do about it…

Some practical ways to invite more radical rest into your days:

1. Begin with NO.
   This is my favourite nervous system support. Start exploring rest with full permission to nope out of it. Like “I don’t want to, you can’t make me”. Give yourself all the choice and agency, and honour what your body is telling you. Your no is sacred.
   

2. Ask yourself what kind of rest you need.
   Physical, mental, emotional, energetic? Maybe you need a nap, or perhaps you need to take a walk with your phone left at home. Maybe you need a long chat with someone who gets you. Maybe you need to practice some breathwork to clear some stagnant energy. Build an internal rollodex of the ways you need rest.
   
   And if you need ideas I literally have a free list of 100 Ways to Rest, you can get it here.
   

3. Titrate your rest.
   This is the somatic term for taking teeny tiny steps. If rest feels hard to access, the pressure of a 90 minute silent restorative yoga class is going to be an intense (and not so restful) place to start. Do something tiny and doable instead. 10 seconds of feeling your feet on the floor. Three slow breaths. A pause to stretch in between emails. Easing in little moments of rest to your day.
   

4. Unlearn urgency.
   You get to have a restful relationship to resting. Let it unfold over time. Because, frankly, if you’re rushing, or forcing, or grinding rest it’s not rest. It’s, like, the performance of rest.
   

5. Practice.
   I know, I always say practice. But it’s because the things you do regularly are the things you expand in your life. Practice resting like a scientist (gathering data points), or like an artist (following inspiration), or like a monk (with dedicated devotion).